"Seven Pounds a Day" 11x14 in. Acrylic on Canvas
I dream of wolves. I have been dreaming of wolves for almost 20 years. It's only recently, however, that I have begun painting them. I paint dream memories of these wolves, who come to me in my sleep. The environment of my wolf dreams contains snow, trees, fallen trees, light and shadows, or hills and cliff sides. When I was 19, I had my first significant wolf dream, and it was this: I was walking through a mountain forest late in the evening. There was snow and it cast that particular ambient light that only snow can do just before dark. A wolf came timidly from the woods and, at a careful distance, trekked parallel from me. She weaved effortlessly through the density of the forest, and diligently kept watchful on my clumsy two-footed stumble over the rooted rocky terrain. I wasn't afraid. I felt the cold of the snow and decided to seek shelter. I found a hollow of a fallen decomposing tree and crawled in. And then the wolf entered the refuge. She spoke to me. She offered me an arrow and told me to kill her so I could take her coat. I speared her through her snout but she did not die. Instead she transformed into what I can only describe as the sleep to wake transformation, the shift of consciousness that brings one back to reality. She was the manifestation of what occurs between sleep and awake, and by doing so, embedded herself firmly in both worlds.
Mikhyla Stewart was born in 1975 in the West Kootenays of British Columbia. At age six she and her family moved to Seattle, Washington, where she lived until the age of twenty. Realizing the US was not her home, she packed up and moved on her own back to BC where she has been residing since 1996. She is currently in Vancouver. Mikhyla has her degree in fine arts through Emily Carr University of Art and Design. She is a multi-disciplined artist but mainly explores conceptions through paint. Mikhyla has exhibited her work in numerous solo, shared, and group shows in BC.
